As I was falling asleep last night I had another realization about this naming scheme that made me laugh pretty hard. I always wondered why Debian unstable was named Sid. https://pixar.fandom.com/wiki/Sid
Yup, I started with RedHat... forget what version, 4, probably 5? Really couldn't get behind the rpm system. I think Debian might have been like the 2nd or 3rd distro I tried and it stuck a lot better. This was back in... 97 or 98? or so.
Still using it today in the home lab/personal server in the basement.
Raw rpm was horrible. I used it and I wrote about it, but it was a nightmare. I think I sold an article which was just "here is how to install KDE 2.0 on Red Hat Linux". It was about 3 pages long, and included something like 200 dependency packages that you had to hand-install, one by one.
I am curious to hear what Debian was like before APT came along in 1997 or so.
I remember I used SuSE for ages based solely on how good Yast and Yast2 were. Its almost quaint to remember how Linux was back in the day, where an installer/setup tool that actually managed to make your system fully usable and configured without any extra tweaking or compiling kernel modules for hardware support was an honest to god selling point and killer feature.
Reflecting back on it makes me appreciate all the early gurus who got us to where we are now.
Still remember being introduced to it in 2005 while working in the UK as sailing instructor for a summer job. An older guy showed me how he automated cataloging his grandma's possessions for auction with it, which deeply fascinated me.
Back home, after lots of trial and error, I used it to run a mail- and webserver for my first business.
The most important feature of Debian has been its governance and focus on community. That's the difference between it and CentOS or its derivatives, and why I'll keep using it forever - it's fundamentally sustainable. Here's to 30 more years!
I wish the CentOS forkers would see this in particular: it's just been amazing to see them continue to want to build on such shifting sands you fundamentally don't control. There _is_ a community-controlled distro that also has does stable and long term releases, and it is Debian! And it's really great!
I'm not entirely sure would be needed. The circumstances of his death are tragic but also pretty much what I expect from someone in his position. The tendency among the tech community is to think expertise and intelligence applies across fields, its the perfect Dunning-Krugar trap. He was drunk as hell, and adamant he knew more then the police. Everything follows from that and his twitter rants that night about how he's 'a white man-- not a n**ger' and talking about how much money he made just reinforces that.
He was clearly shaken, but he had a good point about fighting against police brutality, and he understood that it was about class, power and opportunity, not skin color
I used Debian as a student when I had time to endlessly edit config files. What's the state today? Is it possible to just use it to get work done, say, on a Thinkpad?
It's not for everyone but I transitioned to ChromeOS for this exact reason. You still have a debian environment you can work in (run CLI, GUI apps) but the base desktop environment is ChromeOS which "just works" as they say.
What is "work" in this context? Why were you editing config files all the time?
I find Debian very user-friendly, there shouldn't be much config file tinkering, especially if the machine is well supported by Linux. The situation is probably better than a few years ago, but overall I think that's been the case for some time now.
I'm primarily interested in
1. having all hardware work out of the box,
2. working suspend to disk/RAM,
3. not having to edit `Xorg.conf`,
4. relatively painless upgrades.
Ubuntu gives me all of that and has served me well for 15 years. But their transition to snap forces me to look for something else.
1 & 2 really depend on what hardware you have. But if you get 1 & 2 today from Ubuntu, I'm willing to bet that you'll get exactly that from Debian as well.
3 hasn't been a thing for a few years now. `Xorg.conf` technically still exists, but the normal display configuration flow doesn't touch it.
4 is better in Debian than it is in Ubuntu, in my opinion. Updates are really painless and well done. But notice that the cycle is different: Ubuntu gives you 6 months release cycles and an LTS every 2 years. Debian gives you a "when it's ready" release cycle with a expected time of 3-4 years, and two rolling releases. That is, "stable" is like a LTS release.
If you're running a desktop system, you should probably use "testing", despite the name.
> If you're running a desktop system, you should probably use "testing", despite the name.
I'm not sure I agree, maybe a better compromise is:
* run stable by default
* if at one point there are too many packages that you find outdated and which have a suitable version in testing, upgrade to testing, pinning the distribution name, so that you're back to (the new) stable once it's promoted
Testing changes a lot right after a release, so I find it better to avoid it during that phase if I don't strictly need it. There are also more upgrades in testing and unstable than in stable, and the less upgrades, the less I need to reboot (or at least close my user session) which is a plus.
If you're comfortable with Linux definitely, I'm using Debian stable both at work (Latitude) and home (Thinkpad) for several years now.
One issue with Debian was the lack of support for proprietary firmware in the stock installer from the Debian web site. A lot of people trying Debian and not aware of this ended up stuck with no WiFi support during installation for example. But this has been fixed, the Debian Bookworm stock disk image includes firmware now.
The Debian default desktop environment seems more polished out of the box than it used to. It's very dumbed-down corporate Gnome non-power-user, but you can just GUI click for your settings, and everything works.
Yes, you can just get work done with it on ThinkPads (both modern ones, and many older ones).
Debian also offers you a few other desktop environment options, some of which will need more tweaking than the default.
Personally, I ignore all of these, and did my config files tweaking atop Xorg and Xmonad, years ago, and keep using mostly the same setup with each major Debian version since then.
(So far, Debian hasn't forced ads onto my start menu, reverted my explicit opt-outs, spied on me, manipulated me against my interests to suit someone else's business or promotion criteria, etc.)
First time I used Debian was 2005 when it was the easiest option I could find to install Linux on a Sun Sparc Station LX with netboot. Still my favorite and my go-to Distro.
Yeah I hadn't for ages either but have been using RHEL at work for almost a year. It's very annoying because of occasionally missing packages (e.g. `z3`), and just having to figure out different names of packages etc.
However I would have to say that `dnf` (the new `yum`) is waaay better than apt. For a start it is much much faster to install things. I don't know why apt is so slow.
But also it comes with great features to help you deal with very common and tedious Linux admin tasks, like "what package do I install to get this file my program is demanding?" (`dnf provides`) and they have some very nice features like if you run a command and it isn't installed it will offer to install it for you and then run your original command. Someone actually thought about UX for once.
Or if you run a program and it can't find a shared library, it will tell you all the missing libraries, not just the first one. It would be amazing if it also offered to install the right packages but it doesn't quite yet.
So in conclusion I'd stick with Debian given the choice but I sure wish the Apt developers would spend some time using dnf.
> However I would have to say that `dnf` (the new `yum`) is waaay better than apt. For a start it is much much faster to install things. I don't know why apt is so slow.
I (and everyone else I know of) have the opposite experience, which pretty much matches the numbers here: <https://michael.stapelberg.ch/posts/2019-08-17-linux-package...>. DNF seems to be 0.1% faster than YUM, but it’s still not competitive with other package managers.
Yeah it's because its metadata update is automatic and stupidly slow and he's only installing one package so that dominates. When you're installing 100 packages it's a lot faster though.
But it is quite annoying - I wish the update were faster.
1) zstd compressed metadata. Currently almost all repos use gzip, but zstd works better. All the software support is in place it just needs to be used, and Fedora will likely be turning out on soon.
2) dnf5 will do a better job of parallelizing metadata downloads. Currently it happens one repo at a time.
3) dnf5 will avoid downloading file lists.xml when it's not needed, which is a big help because that file tends to be the largest one
Hopefully then it will be faster than apt without any asterisks
How am I supposed to get scared of systemd without 10 years of using Linux distros? If I am comfortable without using MS/Apple/Google software then systemd is the last barrier between me and freedom.
Debian and Ubuntu have similarities, but keep in mind - Ubuntu is derived from Debian, not the other way around. However, they differ in areas like release cycles, package management, and default configurations.
What you just said is such a well known truism, so it is actually rude to imply that someone on HN would not know that. My point was, however, is from the users point of view Bookworm is very very similar to 22.10 however it is an lts, so for those who want to switch from Ubuntu, this is the experience they should expect.
I'm supposed to make a choice? To understand something and then decide for myself? Wtf? This must be some new millennials shit, they want to ruin our society :(
Here's to 30 more years of OSX/Windows users complaining about how things that people has been using for 30 years are unusable!
There are so many ways to rename stuff on linux that if instead of connecting the keyboard to the trash can you connected it to the brain you could have found that you can configure any action to any key/combination, I have rename on F2, nothing extremely difficult
This isn't really a problem with Debian but just "desktop Linux" in general. Lots of little quality of life/usability things that just don't exist or don't work. I'm a pretty happy user of Ubuntu w/gnome but I'm not going to pretend that it's some kind of great desktop system. I just prefer to use it anyway.
There certainly are aspects that could be better, but renaming is not one of them.
The default behavior on Windows File Explorer is actually a bad UX decision imo. You click a file and you might accidentally rename the file in the process. Please don't attach too much (hidden) behavior. Sure I got used to it in Windows, but it's surely not the best way to rename files. It should be explicit and if you do it often, you can use the shortcut (that is just F2 usually).
This sort of comment is a complete joke. You get what you pay for buddy. And nobody cares about your personal preferences. Also, as a datapoint, I hate the default macOS/windows behaviour and prefer the key combos.
Linux distributions, including Debian, offer a variety of desktop environments, each with its own design philosophy and user experience. If one environment doesn't suit your preferences, others might be more to your liking. It's worth exploring different desktop environments to find one that aligns with your expectations.
What? I've been running Debian for more than a decade by now.
Through multiple releases without re-install. Moved from PC to PC to PC. Not ideal, but it works.
Different desktop environments. File management, web surfing, playing movies using dozens audio/video codecs, gaming (also some native Windows ones), electronics / programmable logic design (Xilinx ISE) & more, all on the same system no VM stuff.
My favorite distro, I use it exclusively for the last 4 year. I have Debian Testing on my laptop (T14), workstation, Pi4. Works great. Meanwhile I've been trying Arch, Gentoo, Slackware, FreeBSD, but Debian is the best.
As somebody who's gone from: RedHat 5/6 -> Slackware -> Gentoo -> Debian -> Ubuntu -> Debian. Debian (and it's derivatives) is the best of breed and will always be my distro of choice. Great job yall!
My first distro was Red Hat 5 as well. It is disambigous, it was called "Red Hat Linux version 5". Red Hat Linux went to version 9 I believe before it split into RHEL (Red Hat Enterprise Linux) and Fedora.
I have almost the same way:
Redhat 5 -> Mandrake -> Gentoo -> FreeBSD -> Slackware, and finally Debian Etch in April 2007.
I've been using Debian for the latest 16 years and am very happy with it.
yeah, now you say it, I think it were some CD's containing a copy of the TSX archive. Installing from that source was like playing Quake in nightmare mode :-) Took me months to get the sound working :-)
Debian is the only linux distro that has been able to manage an unbroken line of upgrades working across systems for many, many years. No other distro that I'm aware of has been able to do this without botching upgrades to the point that a reinstall was the only option left. That, and it's governance model and staying true to their mission are all major accomplishments.
It's a pity that Ian Murdock did not live to see his brainchild become 30. I owe that man a lot.
In the 15 or so years I've been using Debian I can't remember ever having any issues with upgrades. It has always just worked smooth as butter for me. Every one of my devices (except phone and Steam Deck of course) is running Debian, and hopefully they always will!
I think I'll celebrate it's birthday by wearing my Debian t-shirt today :)
I have a laptop running openSUSE Leap that I've been upgrading every year without problems since 2017. I only use it for listening to podcasts and watching the occasional video, but still.
OpenBSD, too, has been a pleasure in this regard. I have another laptop that I originally installed 6.7 on and have been upgrading ever since, again without a problem (again, though, I only use it for watching videos and sometimes for testing/debugging code).
Having said that, Debian's track record in this regard is very impressive indeed.
My first Linux install was the Yggdrasil fall 1994, then took a hiatus (Windows) then moved to Red Hat version something, then Mandrake, then one day discovered Debian (Sarge at that time), liked apt a lot more than rpm and stuck with it. Today I also run Manjaro on laptops and Alpine on smallish things (older stuff, embedded, etc) but my main machine is and will remain Debian: it's the one I'm more familiar with when I need to do something under the hood, and does the job nicely. Happy Birthday!
I'm very pleased with Debian 11 XFCE as a daily driver on one of my laptops.
With only a very few caveats, it can be installed, with a nice looking UI. (Wrote up a few notes for myself at [1]).
Even bluetooth works perfect, connecting my Bose headset flawlessly, which even the latest Linux Mint had problem with.
The only thing I haven't got working is connecting my Phone (A Sony Xperia 10 II), and our old printer. I'm sure it is possible, but haven't found a quick solution, and have so little time for fiddling. It's a bummer, since a plain Debian (XFCE) install is so very clean and stable!
106 comments
[ 4.8 ms ] story [ 176 ms ] threadI played around with Potato, started to felt in love with Woody, and since Sarge Debian has been my one and only distro.
Many derivatives have been able to expand in other directions because of the ability of Debian to create beginners.
HBD!
Still using it today in the home lab/personal server in the basement.
I am curious to hear what Debian was like before APT came along in 1997 or so.
You were using Debian, Red Hat or SuSE? Not Slackware? Pfff... normie.
I think that consolidated it as difficult for beginners. The fact it offered very few technical advantages was the nail in the coffin.
Reflecting back on it makes me appreciate all the early gurus who got us to where we are now.
But I tried Ubuntu "Warty Warthog" and jumped ship.
Back home, after lots of trial and error, I used it to run a mail- and webserver for my first business.
I wish the CentOS forkers would see this in particular: it's just been amazing to see them continue to want to build on such shifting sands you fundamentally don't control. There _is_ a community-controlled distro that also has does stable and long term releases, and it is Debian! And it's really great!
https://archive.ph/20151229023650/https://twitter.com/imurdo...
Where did he say the word nigger?
He was clearly shaken, but he had a good point about fighting against police brutality, and he understood that it was about class, power and opportunity, not skin color
I find Debian very user-friendly, there shouldn't be much config file tinkering, especially if the machine is well supported by Linux. The situation is probably better than a few years ago, but overall I think that's been the case for some time now.
I'm primarily interested in 1. having all hardware work out of the box, 2. working suspend to disk/RAM, 3. not having to edit `Xorg.conf`, 4. relatively painless upgrades.
Ubuntu gives me all of that and has served me well for 15 years. But their transition to snap forces me to look for something else.
3 hasn't been a thing for a few years now. `Xorg.conf` technically still exists, but the normal display configuration flow doesn't touch it.
4 is better in Debian than it is in Ubuntu, in my opinion. Updates are really painless and well done. But notice that the cycle is different: Ubuntu gives you 6 months release cycles and an LTS every 2 years. Debian gives you a "when it's ready" release cycle with a expected time of 3-4 years, and two rolling releases. That is, "stable" is like a LTS release. If you're running a desktop system, you should probably use "testing", despite the name.
I'm not sure I agree, maybe a better compromise is:
* run stable by default
* if at one point there are too many packages that you find outdated and which have a suitable version in testing, upgrade to testing, pinning the distribution name, so that you're back to (the new) stable once it's promoted
Testing changes a lot right after a release, so I find it better to avoid it during that phase if I don't strictly need it. There are also more upgrades in testing and unstable than in stable, and the less upgrades, the less I need to reboot (or at least close my user session) which is a plus.
You're right. But, to be honest: my solution to that is to run unstable.
One issue with Debian was the lack of support for proprietary firmware in the stock installer from the Debian web site. A lot of people trying Debian and not aware of this ended up stuck with no WiFi support during installation for example. But this has been fixed, the Debian Bookworm stock disk image includes firmware now.
Yes, you can just get work done with it on ThinkPads (both modern ones, and many older ones).
Debian also offers you a few other desktop environment options, some of which will need more tweaking than the default.
Personally, I ignore all of these, and did my config files tweaking atop Xorg and Xmonad, years ago, and keep using mostly the same setup with each major Debian version since then.
(So far, Debian hasn't forced ads onto my start menu, reverted my explicit opt-outs, spied on me, manipulated me against my interests to suit someone else's business or promotion criteria, etc.)
happy 30th! happy debianday!
However I would have to say that `dnf` (the new `yum`) is waaay better than apt. For a start it is much much faster to install things. I don't know why apt is so slow.
But also it comes with great features to help you deal with very common and tedious Linux admin tasks, like "what package do I install to get this file my program is demanding?" (`dnf provides`) and they have some very nice features like if you run a command and it isn't installed it will offer to install it for you and then run your original command. Someone actually thought about UX for once.
Or if you run a program and it can't find a shared library, it will tell you all the missing libraries, not just the first one. It would be amazing if it also offered to install the right packages but it doesn't quite yet.
So in conclusion I'd stick with Debian given the choice but I sure wish the Apt developers would spend some time using dnf.
You can install apt-file, and then use `apt-file search`.
I (and everyone else I know of) have the opposite experience, which pretty much matches the numbers here: <https://michael.stapelberg.ch/posts/2019-08-17-linux-package...>. DNF seems to be 0.1% faster than YUM, but it’s still not competitive with other package managers.
But it is quite annoying - I wish the update were faster.
1) zstd compressed metadata. Currently almost all repos use gzip, but zstd works better. All the software support is in place it just needs to be used, and Fedora will likely be turning out on soon.
2) dnf5 will do a better job of parallelizing metadata downloads. Currently it happens one repo at a time.
3) dnf5 will avoid downloading file lists.xml when it's not needed, which is a big help because that file tends to be the largest one
Hopefully then it will be faster than apt without any asterisks
Really? After 10 years of using distros with systemd, you'd consider switching because you're "scared" of it?
It's more difficult in desktop installs.
There are so many ways to rename stuff on linux that if instead of connecting the keyboard to the trash can you connected it to the brain you could have found that you can configure any action to any key/combination, I have rename on F2, nothing extremely difficult
The default behavior on Windows File Explorer is actually a bad UX decision imo. You click a file and you might accidentally rename the file in the process. Please don't attach too much (hidden) behavior. Sure I got used to it in Windows, but it's surely not the best way to rename files. It should be explicit and if you do it often, you can use the shortcut (that is just F2 usually).
Through multiple releases without re-install. Moved from PC to PC to PC. Not ideal, but it works.
Different desktop environments. File management, web surfing, playing movies using dozens audio/video codecs, gaming (also some native Windows ones), electronics / programmable logic design (Xilinx ISE) & more, all on the same system no VM stuff.
And you can't rename a single file?
It's a pity that Ian Murdock did not live to see his brainchild become 30. I owe that man a lot.
I think I'll celebrate it's birthday by wearing my Debian t-shirt today :)
Might be something fun for NCommander
OpenBSD, too, has been a pleasure in this regard. I have another laptop that I originally installed 6.7 on and have been upgrading ever since, again without a problem (again, though, I only use it for watching videos and sometimes for testing/debugging code).
Having said that, Debian's track record in this regard is very impressive indeed.
With only a very few caveats, it can be installed, with a nice looking UI. (Wrote up a few notes for myself at [1]).
Even bluetooth works perfect, connecting my Bose headset flawlessly, which even the latest Linux Mint had problem with.
The only thing I haven't got working is connecting my Phone (A Sony Xperia 10 II), and our old printer. I'm sure it is possible, but haven't found a quick solution, and have so little time for fiddling. It's a bummer, since a plain Debian (XFCE) install is so very clean and stable!
[1] https://rillabs.com/posts/installing-and-configuring-debian-...